The four dominant trends in payments, trade, and value

Today’s financial system is undergoing one of the most profound transformations in decades. What were once considered long-term trends are now active forces reshaping how payments, trade, data, and value move across borders and through markets.

We are living in a golden era of innovation, as money is redefined, new rails and players emerge, and technology and AI accelerate the industry’s shift from incremental change to structural evolution. Four themes emerge with particular clarity; together, they explain not only where the industry is heading, but how quickly it is getting there.

Payments are evolving 

The global payments industry today generates approximately $2.5 trillion in revenue from $2.0 quadrillion in value flows, supported by 3.6 trillion transactions worldwide. At that scale, even small shifts in expectations or infrastructure can have a systemic impact. 

Significant progress has already been made. The industry’s collective effort to meet G20 targets has delivered tangible results, most notably the successful migration to ISO 20022. This year marks the point at which its strategic value truly unlocks, taking the end-user experience to the next level. On the securities side, momentum continues to build around T+1 settlement, with upcoming migrations in Europe following similar moves in other markets.

Meanwhile, real-time payments are becoming the norm. Today, 75% of Swift payments reach beneficiary banks in under ten minutes. 

This evolution is being driven by closer links between domestic instant payment systems. For example, the ECB is expanding interoperability between various payment systems, and TIPS is now live with cross-currency services across multiple Nordic markets. In Latin America, Brazil’s Pix is being extended internationally through private-sector QR interoperability, echoing similar bilateral arrangements now emerging for UPI across the Middle East and Southeast Asia.

In parallel, industry efforts are expanding bank-to-wallet and wallet-to-wallet interoperability. A recent Swift-supported live trial between Ant International and Standard Chartered demonstrated ISO 20022-based bank-to-wallet payments, while other industry partnerships have showcased wallet-to-wallet interoperability. Swift has also been working on the new retail payments scheme framework, with the intention to advance upfront transparency on payment costs while committing to instant settlement where available.

Together, these initiatives point to a future of faster and increasingly interconnected cross-border payments.

Tokenisation and digital assets 

A second major shift is unfolding: the accelerated progress of tokenisation and digital assets.

Industry leaders are converging on a clear message – tokenisation is moving beyond experimentation and into the core of financial infrastructure. Regulated digital assets are increasingly being viewed not only as speculative instruments but as legitimate means of exchange and stores of value, capable of unlocking faster, cheaper, and more inclusive markets.

The numbers reflect this momentum. The stablecoin market has grown by 49% in 2025, reaching approximately USD 306 billion at the end of November.

One of the most important enablers of this growth is regulatory clarity. New policy frameworks are reducing uncertainty around issuance, operation, and oversight. Examples include The Genius Act in the United States, and MiCA in the European Union, alongside regulatory advances in the UK, the Middle East, Hong Kong, Singapore, Australia and Japan.

Clearer rules around licensing, reserve management, AML, and KYC are lowering barriers to entry, boosting confidence, and accelerating adoption. For the first time, stablecoins and other tokenised assets are being developed at scale within a framework of trust and compliance.

The industry is also pursuing its own digital currency solutions to harness the advantages of blockchain technology. The challenge is not innovation, it is interoperability. Unless new technologies seamlessly connect with the existing ecosystem, we end up with a fragmented landscape, which benefits nobody. Our own research, carried out with Economist Impact, has shown that fragmentation could wipe as much as 6% from global GDP by 2030. 

This is where Swift’s work on interoperability and a shared blockchain-based ledger takes on strategic importance. The ledger will facilitate the trusted movement of regulated, tokenised value across digital ecosystems, while maintaining the trust, resilience and compliance critical to the secure functioning of global finance and synonymous with the Swift network. Uniting traditional finance with emerging networks, preventing digital islands from developing, and enabling the benefits of tokenisation and blockchain-based ledgers to scale across the financial community are at the heart of Swift’s strategy.

At the World Economic Forum in Davos in January 2026, industry leaders made one point unmistakable: real-world value is ready to move at internet speed, yet interoperability and trust will determine whether that promise can be realised at scale.

Technology and AI take centre stage

Technology has always shaped financial services, but the pace of change today is unprecedented. Artificial intelligence (AI), quantum computing and advanced analytics are accelerating just as resilience, trust, and operational excellence remain firmly in focus.

Across the industry, organisations are shifting away from legacy systems towards application programming interface (API)-first, AI-driven platforms that can adapt faster and support increasingly liquid, cross-border flows.

In particular, agentic AI is gaining traction; notable industry players are using it for real-time payment orchestration, exception handling, fraud detection, and improved customer experience. Meanwhile, in trade finance, AI-powered OCR and document processing are cutting costs and turnaround times. Despite this progress, the industry is still grappling with how to measure AI’s impact and value at scale.

API-first ecosystems are becoming the foundation for this shift. Banks are consolidating payment rails into ISO-native, API-enabled platforms that make it easier to introduce new services and support cross-border activity.

Trade is following a similar path. There is an industry-wide push to digitise documents, particularly electronic bills of lading, and to leverage APIs to reduce friction, improve transparency, and unlock liquidity faster.

A proliferation of new players 

Finally, the competitive landscape itself is expanding well beyond traditional players.

A new breed of nimble, technology-driven innovators is reshaping the ecosystem. Emerging digital networks, private and public consortia, and closed-loop systems are challenging established models across payments, trade, securities, and digital assets. Their focus is on interoperability, speed, and end-to-end digital experiences.

Digital assets are a clear example of this, where the ecosystem is both crowded and fragmented. Multiple technologies, standards, regulations and use cases coexist. This fragmentation makes interoperability and harmonisation not just desirable, but essential for the next phase of growth.

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These shifts are already influencing client expectations, regulatory priorities, and the flow of capital and value across markets.

Three conclusions stand out:

1. Fragmentation is the current state – but interoperability is the strategic objective: While new networks and technologies continue to emerge, the ability to connect them reliably will be the primary determinant of scale and impact.
2. From experimentation to execution: Digital assets are moving beyond pilots into operational environments, with resilience, trust, and regulatory alignment remaining foundational requirements rather than trade-offs.
3. The ecosystem will continue to diversify, increasing the importance of coordination and oversight: New entrants will drive innovation, but sustained progress will depend on collaboration and careful integration with existing financial infrastructure.

Within this evolving landscape, established networks remain deeply embedded in global finance. For more than 50 years, Swift has connected more than 11,500 institutions across over 200 countries and territories, while remaining agnostic to both technology and currencies. But there’s more to do.

The future of payments, trade, and value is being shaped in real time. How these forces converge will determine not only the next phase of the industry but the robustness and inclusivity of the infrastructure that supports global commerce.